


Frenemies

by Spencer5460



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Ficlet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-15
Updated: 2016-07-15
Packaged: 2018-07-24 04:32:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7493922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spencer5460/pseuds/Spencer5460
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The war had taught him there were a thousand ways to die.  He’d be damned if living half a life was going to be his.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Frenemies

**Frenemies** (just because I can't think of anything else to call this)

 _“We have met the enemy and they are ours.”_ Oliver Hazard Perry

**Years Earlier**

John shouldn’t have come back. Not when others who had so much more to live for, couldn’t. All those brave and beautiful men and women who had families and lovers and futures waiting for them. All he had was his one-room flat and his pension and his computer that sat silently on the corner of his desk as if watching him. Waiting for something to happen.

John glared at it. It could keep on bloody waiting. 

‘Nothing ever happens to me,’ he thought to himself for the hundredth time since he’d returned from the war. ‘I should have been able to do more.’ He slammed down the laptop screen then kicked at the cane that leaned against the table. 

‘What am I good for?’ His self-recrimination was bitter. ‘A soldier afraid to fight. A doctor unable to heal. A writer without a story.’ 

For a moment he sympathized with Harriet and her alcohol. At least getting drunk allowed her some measure of escape, even if it was only an illusion. 

But he knew deep in his gut he could never turn to that. Illusions may be beautiful, but he didn’t put his faith in them. Only realities. 

The reality was that people had died under his watch. And there was nothing he could do about it. He suffered from a lack of confidence and a limp. A scientific mind pit against a poet’s soul. And it was time he accepted it. He could stay within these four walls and wither away or he could step out and face his demons. 

The war had taught him there were a thousand ways to die. He’d be damned if living half a life was going to be his. 

 

**Years Later**

 

Sherlock sat with his feet outstretched by the fire and watched the snow fall gently outside the window as he sipped his cognac. It warmed his throat as the fire warmed his toes. A thoroughly pleasurable sensation. Decadent, John might say.

Sherlock smiled at John sitting across the room pecking at his keyboard. How many times had Sherlock wished him here when he was not? How many times had Sherlock been gone and longed to be home? It had taken much too long but now both wishes had come true. If he believed in such romantic nonsense.

“Do you know why I keep you around, John?”

John paused but didn’t look up. He was focused intently on the screen in front of him where his current blog was struggling to life like an early flower. Some days it seemed as though nothing would come of it, while other times stories seemed to spring to life overnight. Small miracles that never ceased to amaze him.

“I suppose it’s to pay my half of the rent.” 

“Don’t be ridiculous. I can manage that quite well myself.”

As much as John’s work pulled at him, Sherlock drew him in as well. And he knew if he didn’t offer some response Sherlock would simply continue to pester. 

"Then to keep you and Mycroft from killing each other.” John moved his fingers over the keypad and a paragraph was magically transformed.

“Killing Mycroft would be a tragedy only in the eyes of my mother.” Sherlock sniffed and took another sip of cognac.

It was John’s turn to smile. He’d learned to recognize Sherlock’s haughty remark for what it was. The vestiges of childish competitiveness from a savant who had been a lonely boy, still unsure how to accept love as a man. 

“Why, then, Sherlock?” John stilled his hands and looked up. 

“I hope you’re not waiting for me to say it’s because I admire your brilliance.”

“We both know better than _that_.”

“Well, yes.” Sherlock agreed coolly.

“Then _why?_ ” It was John’s turn to pester.

Sherlock tipped his glass back to catch the last drops of liquid warmth. “It’s because you’re the bravest man I know,” he said when he had finished.

“I’m not brave, Sherlock,” John said quietly. “The war terrified me. Broke me.” He turned his head to gaze out the window. The snow continued to fall, shrouding the street below.

“Maybe so. But it didn’t _stop_ you.”

When John stayed silent, Sherlock continued.

“Brave men aren’t the ones who don’t get frightened, you know. Brave men are the ones who face their fear.” He set his glass down on the side table and wiggled his toes before the crackling flames. “That makes you far braver than me, John. I hide behind my intellect. You hide behind nothing.”

Sherlock was nothing if not disconcertingly frank. It could still take John by surprise. 

“Why thank you, Sherlock,” John cleared his throat. He didn’t need the cognac or the fire to feel a most delicious warmth spread all the way through him. He looked back at his friend. “And when did you happen to deduce that?” 

“I knew it from the first,” said Sherlock with a gleam in his eye.

**FIN**


End file.
